In early July, on the sleepy Friday after Independence Day, the USDA quietly signaled its intention to green-light a new genetically engineered soybean seed from Dow AgroSciences. The product is designed to produce soy plants that withstand 2,4-D, a highly toxic herbicide (and, famously, the less toxic component in the notorious Vietnam War-era defoliant Agent Orange). Continue reading →

Safety Review of Glyphosate Herbicide Faces Tough Critics

Glyphosate, the non-selective herbicide that is the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup formula, is up for a routine safety review in the United States and Canada. The herbicide has been used in eliminating weeds in soybeans, corn, cotton, as well as for lawn and garden maintenance since the early 1970s. “More than 2 billion lbs of herbicide were used globally in 2007, with one quarter of that total – 531 million lbs – used in the United States in that timeframe, according to a report issued in February by the EPA,” recently reported Reuters. Since at least 1996, the thirst for glyphosate was fueled in large measure by the development of glyphosate tolerant crops (e.g., Monsanto’s Roundup Ready lines), which are able to withstand continued application of this herbicide. Continue reading →

CORNUCOPIA, WI – It’s not often that family-scale farmers can go toe-to-toe with a $12 billion agribusiness and come out victors. But organic soybean producers, and a modestly scaled but powerful ally, The Cornucopia Institute, are claiming victory over Dean Foods in the organic marketplace.[Full news release at http://www.cornucopia.org/2010/09/not-crying-over-spilt-soymilk/]Dean Foods, the manufacturer of Silk, the top-selling soymilk drink, was first “outed” in Cornucopia’s May 2009 report, Behind the Bean: The Heroes and Charlatans of the Natural and Organic Soy Foods Industry, for switching its soybean sourcing from American farms to cheaper organic beans from China. Later in 2009, Cornucopia revealed that Dean Foods had then largely abandoned organic soybeans altogether, stealthily changing the soybeans in their core Silk product line from organic to less expensive conventionally grown soybeans that the company was calling “natural.”

The shift away from organic outraged many loyal consumers and alienated retailers across the country that were not informed of the change and continued to inaccurately merchandise Silk products as “organic.”

Now leading natural/organic foods retailer Whole Foods Market has decided to shift its soy milk offerings back towards organic. Saying that its relationship with Dean Foods had “chilled,” Whole Foods indicated it was bringing in a new branded organic soy milk partner, Earth Balance. The national retailer also told the Denver Post, in an August 27 story, that it wanted Earth Balance’s soy milk products to contain only domestically grown soybeans carrying the organic label.

A recent study by eminent oncologists Dr. Lennart Hardell and Dr. Mikael
Eriksson of Sweden [1], has revealed clear links between one of the
world’s biggest selling herbicide, glyphosate, to non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a form
of cancer [2].

In the study published in the 15 March 1999 Journal of American Cancer
Society, the researchers also maintain that exposure to glyphosate
‘yielded increased risks for NHL.’ They stress that with the rapidly increasing use
of glyphosate since the time the study was carried out, ‘glyphosate
deserves further epidemiologic studies.’

Glyphosate, commonly known as Roundup, is the world’s most widely used
herbicide. It is estimated that for 1998, over a 112,000 tonnes of
glyphosate was used world-wide. It indiscriminately kills off a wide
variety of weeds after application and is primarily used to control annual
and perennial plants.

CHARLESTON — West Virginia Attorney General Darrell McGraw is worried farmers are spending more for soybeans that are producing identical returns as less expensive ones.

McGraw wrote Monsanto Co. vice president David Snively last week to express his concern with promotions geared to encourage farmers to switch from soybeans with the Roundup Ready trait to those with the Roundup Ready 2 trait.

He says, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 2009’s soybean output of 41 bushels per acre is the same as the previous year.

“Although we are aware that Monsanto’s initial commercial Roundup Ready 2 Yield sales for 2009 were not a full scale rollout, we would have expected to see some increased yield for West Virginia as a result of your company’s representation to farmers,” McGraw wrote.

“I am aware that other factors contribute to yields varying from year to year, such as weather or soil conditions, but virtually all of the studies conducted by major universities and independent testing companies corroborate West Virginia’s experience.”

Monsanto advertised increased yields of 7 percent-11 percent. McGraw said he welcomes a meeting with the company before litigation.